The U.S. Department of War’s Defense Visual Information Distribution Service (DVIDS) published a story last week about the sterile processing department (SPD) at Naval Hospital Bremerton (NHB) that’s a mix of lighthearted and, to anyone who works in perioperative services, alarming.
It’s about how NHB’s SPD staff members held a ribbon-cutting ceremony last week to “formally proclaim restoration of vital cart washer ability after a two-year outage of such a critical service.”
The news service writes, “According to Cmdr. Marissa Hesse, NHB Surgery Department head, after jokingly suggesting that some type of recognition was needed to emphasize having the service back up and running, that notion lead to the ceremonial observance.”
It adds, “No more time-consuming manual washing, cleaning and sanitizing.”
Said Cmdr. Hesse, “The ribbon-cutting ceremony was held to highlight this critical return to full operational capability and recognize the resilience of our surgical staff.”
According to the article, a surgical technologist “several years ago” noticed a drain overflow associated with the previous cart washer. A subsequent safety investigation revealed “severe hazards, including interior rusting and electrified water, necessitating an immediate and permanent shutdown to ensure worker safety.” Cmdr. Hesse told the news outlet that NHB’s SPD and surgical techs completely overhauled their workflows, adjusting to physically grueling manual workarounds to “ensure zero degradation in patient care or surgical readiness.”
Writes DVIDS, “The brief ribbon-cutting ceremony not only formally unveiled the new equipment but also provided the opportunity to publicly recognize the SPD and Main OR surgical technologist teams for their adaptability and hard work during the two-year outage.”
Read the full story here.
